• Since 2014, the Lyon collective Never without a roof has been mobilizing every year to allow school children not to sleep on the streets and to allow their families to be accommodated in schools.

  • He asks that the State take its responsibilities.

    Currently, twelve families are housed in a gymnasium in Lyon, made available to the city.

  • This situation is particularly recurrent in Lyon, as in other cities, but it is unprecedented this year with nearly “262 children without a solution”.

In October, the government assured that it was working so that “there are no children on the street” this winter.

Three months later, this promise has not been kept.

In particular in Lyon where nearly 35 children, with their families, are accommodated in the Chanfray gymnasium, made available by the city until January 15.

A deadline that the community has extended by a week, for lack of a solution proposed by the State services whose competence is emergency accommodation.

These twelve families found themselves without a solution with the closure of the schools, where they were staying, and the situation is likely to last.

“We will not take these people back to the establishments, confides sorry, Raphaël Vulliez of the collective Never without a roof and also a teacher.

It's very difficult to manage, the teams are exhausted and we don't have the vocation to do that.

Since the start of the school year in September, we have paid nearly 20,000 euros in hotel nights.

It is not up to the generosity of citizens to take on the responsibilities of the State.

There is a law, it is a right, it must be applied.

»

In Lyon as elsewhere

On December 18, 85 children were accommodated in 19 schools and each year, on average, according to estimates which remain "well below reality", between 200 and 300 children find themselves without accommodation in Lyon.

But the situation does not only exist in the capital of Gaul.

In December, 44 elected officials from major French cities wrote to the government to alert it to the emergency accommodation of children.

For the mayor of Lyon, Grégory Doucet, the mobilization of his municipality marked a real change compared to previous practices.

“For the first time, I had the impression that this year, it was a subject, he certified.

Before, the police were sent to the establishments, they cut the heating and put everyone outside.

“The elected then promised that” solidarity “was” a priority “and that there would be” actions of the city so that there are no children on the street “.

Raphaël Vulliez thinks, for his part, that the action carried out for more than eight years by Never Without a Roof has regularly brought the Lyon phenomenon into the spotlight: "We have created an important network of support committees to coordinate and update shelter the students but also to give visibility to this problem.

The other cities have reacted more recently but are faced with the same problems.

»

An “unprecedented” situation

But the current local situation remains “unprecedented”, according to the member of the collective, with 262 children who are still unresolved.

"Since the creation of Never Without a Roof in 2014, there have never been so many schools that have welcomed so many students and for so long," he warns.

"Usually, with the activation of the government's cold weather plan, this figure decreases with the first places that open, but this is not the case this year", continues the teacher.

According to him, these would be the effects of the end of the sheltering aid deployed at the time of the health crisis, which ended in July 2022 and hotel places less available since the relaunch sightseeing.

And above all, a lack of anticipation by the government.



“We have been alerted since the start of the summer holidays but developing budgets, buildings, it takes time, exclaims the founding member of the collective.

Especially since the priority policy is housing with permanent places.

We are then in an in-between which is very fragile because we still need an emergency policy, especially in this inflationary context where even more people find themselves in difficulty.

»

The Rhône prefecture for its part defends the creation of 4,050 places in ten years and ensures “to work with a view to opening more places in the coming weeks”.

She underlines “the tense situation” and stresses the need to take “this housing problem as a whole” because “the solution is not sustainable”.

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